Daylight Saving Time will begin on Sunday, March 11 at 2 a.m. Everyone should move their clocks forward to 3 a.m. The annual practice will end on Nov. 4 with moving them back an hour.
The practice of moving the clocks back and forward with the seasons began in the United States during WWI, and was later abandoned and then reinstituted during WWII. It was not until 1966 that the country established a uniform practice of the method, according to the U.S. Naval Observatory.
In the past, changing the clocks came the first Sunday in April and ended on the last Sunday in October.
According to Energy.ca.gov, the Daylight Saving Time will cut the country’s electricity usage by about 1 percent every day.
Since there is one hour less each evening before bedtime, less electricity is used late in the day, according to the site.
“Nationally, Daylight Saving Time may impact household electric lighting patterns or usage, but because lighting represents such a small portion of our (North Georgia Electric Membership Corp.) spring and summer load, it would be impossible to measure the effect of daylight savings on North Georgia EMC’s distribution system,” said Laura Sparks, NGEMC director of marketing and economic development. “During the warmer months, industrial electric load represents a large portion of our demand. Daylight savings has little or no impact on how those large plants operate and use energy.
“We do encourage our residential customers to monitor their own usage patterns and conservation efforts by watching their bill or reading their meters,” she said. “They should take advantage of the extended daylight hours by not using their electric lights until needed.”
Marissa Chambers, Catoosa County Schools communications specialist, said the earlier date for Daylight Saving Time will not change what the schools do each year.
“We will just do same thing earlier,” she said. “We will be reminding the bus drivers it will be darker when they are picking up and reminding children to stand in a place that it is light while waiting for the bus.”
Twins Rosston and Rachel Anne Droke, 8, gave a split decision on whether Daylight Saving Time being earlier is good for them. The second graders said they arrive at Battlefield Primary School between 7 and 7:30 a.m. each day.
When asked if they were excited about soon having to arrive at the equivalent of 6-6:30, Rosston quickly commented, “I wouldn’t be happy about that but I would be happy to get extra time to play baseball in the afternoon.”
Rachel said her brother is an early riser while she prefers sleeping in and often requires some coaxing from her mother to rise after her alarm goes off.
She said she is not happy to get up even earlier but doesn’t see much other effect regarding the change.
Dr. Sandy Boyles, Battlefield Primary principal, said they see little effect with the children when the time change comes and they see no effect on attendance.
“They may be a little sleepier in the morning,” she said.
Georgia Insurance and Safety Fire Commissioner John W. Oxendine wants to remind Georgians that when they change their clocks also change the batteries in their smoke alarms at the same time.
“Every year in Georgia there are fire fatalities in homes that didn’t have smoke alarms, or where the alarms didn’t function because of dead batteries,” Oxendine said in a press release
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